


Not Just One

by Duscara



Series: Kinnis Universe Tetralogy [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Fictional Religion & Theology, G/T, GT, Giant/Tiny, Not a Crossover, Original Fiction, Original Species, Prequel, Ratings: PG, TINY - Freeform, Tiny Brother, Tiny Dad, Tiny Father, Tiny Man, Tiny Mom, Tiny Mother, Tiny Person, Tiny Sister, Tiny people, giant, giant man - Freeform, male giant, sfw, tiny girl, tiny woman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-29
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:26:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27782200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duscara/pseuds/Duscara
Summary: This is a fairly distant prequel to both Hopeful Future and Lucky Discovery. It is distant enough that neither Edo nor Kaly have been born yet, and although Dawn Newman has been born, she is only about two years old, so she wouldn't remember what happened at the time this takes place.This story focuses on new characters and the exposure of a secret...
Relationships: Jobrare Goldberry/Berg Mason
Series: Kinnis Universe Tetralogy [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1913272
Kudos: 2





	1. Moving Out

**Author's Note:**

> At the end of Hopeful Future, I asked my audience which story they wanted to see first: Lucky Discovery or this. Whichever one got more votes would be the first one out, with the other following immediately after. No one said anything, so I released Lucky Discovery first, and now that that's over, it's time for that more distant prequel I promised.
> 
> I didn’t do much research, if any, into what life and pop culture were like back in 2007.

Jobrare Goldberry, a young Kinnis woman, had just turned twenty one years old. Her family believed in traditions that said a Kinnis must leave their parents at twenty one years of age, as that was the sign that they were physically and mentally mature enough to live on their own. They had kept old traditions despite many other groups and families adapting to survive the changing times. The year was 2007, and Kinnises had existed since before humans started recording history, which started about 5,000 years prior. She had a younger sister named Tirtare who was two years younger than her, an older brother named Kitrari who had come of age and left three years prior, a mother named Pomtare, and a father named Loktari. All of them had the last name of Goldberry, as her mother took the family name of Goldberry when she married Loktari, and they had passed that onto their kids. The reason why Loktari and Pomtare had three kids was a safety net for the survival of their family, as if the two parents were killed by a predator or a human, they hoped that at least one of their kids would escape or not be there for that. Given that they were still alive and one of their kids had already left, their plan seemed to be working. 

Jobrare was packing only what she needed to survive. She got a pin to use as a weapon, a few paper clips, a second set of clothes, a bit of yarn, a water container, a basic blanket, and a bandage. She added three grapes, which were quite large to her, into her bag, which had a single button. While the button would be normal to a human, was quite large to Kinnises like her. It was fairly heavy to her, but she could still walk around with it easily. 

“You know how to get vital resources from humans, Jobrare. Right?” Loktari said. 

“I’ll be fine, Dad. You helped teach me how to fly, get resources, and get food. Alright. What traits should I look for in a house?” 

Pomtare replied, “First, if there are mice or rats in a house, leave as soon as you can.” 

“But… we have the same ears and tails as mice. Why can’t we get along?” 

“They cannot be trained as mounts or pets, and they will probably see you as prey, since they’re bigger. Second, don’t live with small human kids or teens. Kids are just plain dumb yet dangerous and will probably kill you without realizing what they’re doing, and teens get too curious and end up harming us. Remember, if a human knows that you exist, leave as soon as you can and search for another house. Stay away from cats and dogs, who can and will kill and eat you. Also, not all other Kinnises are friendly to us, the ones that live in houses with humans. They think we’re foolish, living with the biggest threat to our survival.” 

“I understand. All of those make sense.” 

Pomtare started crying as she said, “Another one of my babies, leaving us! It hurts again, like Kitrari leaving us hurt me!” 

Loktari replied, “We’re fulfilling tradition, Pomtare.” 

“You’re right, but it still hurts!” 

Jobrare said, “I’ll be fine. Goodbye, Mom! Goodbye, Dad!” 

They all exchanged one last hug before she walked away, wondering where she would go. 

Jobrare walked for what seemed to be quite a distance for her. The first house she found looked decent, but there were mice inside, and they were not willing to share. She ran instead of fighting, deciding not to risk injury or worse. Next, she found a lawn with a lot of kids’ toys, and while the chance to insult a human child was tempting, she decided that it was not worth the trouble and risk just to do that, not knowing if there were any toddlers among them. Before she could find another house, night came, and she decided to sleep in a tree, not having anywhere else to sleep. The weather was clear the whole night, but she saw something in her dream that gave her supernatural fear, and she heard a terrifying voice repeating, “An enemy moves out. A unique demon now serves me, and he will make them suffer!” 

By the time the sun rose again, it was not even 6 AM. Jobrare decided to get a move on, feeling rested despite the voice, which she remembered clearly. She managed to climb to the top of the tree to get a view. The leaves had grown back months ago, so she could remain hidden. There was one a bit farther away. She considered flying to it, even preparing to get a running start, but she realized it would be very easy to see her, so she decided against it. 

It took six hours to get to the house, and it looked perfect. There were no mice, rats, children, teens, cats, or hostile Kinnises, and after sneaking around, she found the owner to be a single young man, who only looked to be a couple years older than her at most. She decided to move there, but she had no idea where her parents were. She prayed to Zineas, who her family worshiped, that she would be safe and not be noticed. 

After plenty of work that was hidden with convenient rain, Jobrare made a small home of two floors. The first floor was accessed through a mouse hole behind the fridge, and there was enough room for four small furniture items along the length and width. It was inside the walls. There were stairs in the small hall that separated the kitchen from her home, and they took her to the basement, which had room for six small furniture items along its length and width. The basement was under the floorboards. 

She kept her bag in the smaller room inside the wall. That way, she could grab it on the way out when she needed to take things. She took out her blanket and took it down to the lower floor. She decided to sleep in that room so that it would be harder, if not impossible for the man to see her sleeping. 

Once she set up, her body’s internal clock told her it was time to sleep. She thought about it, and realized that it was pretty simple, as all it did was “tell” her when it was time to eat and when it was time to sleep. 

She tried to get comfortable when sleeping on the floor, but it was hard because it was not at all comfortable. She decided that she should get a proper living space the next day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the measurements for Jobrare’s living space and its two areas from how many 1 by 1 furniture pieces could fit into the room in Animal Crossing if it was scaled down to Kinnis size.


	2. First Loot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kaly learns the name of the human she secretly lives with and takes things from him for the first time.
> 
> She also has a strange dream...

Jobrare woke up from her sleeping area. It was nothing more than a blanket she laid under under the floorboards. As soon as she was fully awake, she felt that she was in good shape for the day, so she decided to eat a single grape. It was so large compared to her that she could not possibly eat the entire thing, so she ripped it into smaller pieces, but even that was not enough to let her eat it all. She thought about a horror story her parents told her, where a human discovered a community of Kinnises in a forest. The human went on a rampage, killing Kinnises either by eating them, sometimes without bothering to kill them first (so they were eating Kinnises alive), by stepping on them, or by crushing them in their hands. It even ate an entire family. The guards of that area tried to fight back, but they had trained with predators like wolves and foxes, so they were unprepared for the sheer size of humans. Despite that, the guards managed to kill the human. The community still took that as a defeat, though, because many Kinnises died, some of which were entire bloodlines wiped from the world. 

Jobrare did not know where that took place, as it changed depending on who told the story, like human legends. She decided to gather some information on the human she lived with. To do so, she sneaked to his computer while he was away at work. She flew up to the keyboard and mouse and tried to search his emails and local files to learn more about him. After figuring out how to use those at her size, she learned that the name of the man she lived with was Berg Mason. Not wanting to stay where he could see her any longer, she jumped down, using her wings to slow her fall. She ran back to her home, which she only just realized how empty it really was. 

She decided that, for her first time taking things from humans in her new home, she would improve her home with an actual table. She waited for night to come, and during that time, Berg came home, and she saw he had an outfit she found strange, with a hat, apron, some words, and a symbol. He himself looked to be tan, with long, messy hair and facial hair that she did not like. She could not get a good view from her room in the wall. She silently prayed not to be found, as he was much more massive than she had thought he would be. 

Night finally came, so Jobrare came out of her hiding spot, and she wandered around, looking for something she could use. She found some hard plastic toys that could be put together and taken apart, and read a box and learned they were called Blox. She managed to make a table that would work for her out of them, and there were many, many more, so she hoped he wouldn’t notice. She made a table out of the pieces, and took it back. She still had plenty of the night left, so she decided to risk it and get a stool. She thought of what she could use, and decided to see if she could find a cork. She returned to the kitchen, flew to the counter top, and saw empty bottles she did not like the smell of. There were plenty of sponges and powder puffs as well as corks, so she took one cork back. She decided not to risk it anymore that night. She decided to sleep in the section below the floorboards. She hoped he wouldn’t notice the missing things… 

Once Jobrare fell asleep, she had a strange dream that night. In it, she encountered a strange creature. It was not human, but it was not a creature she had ever seen before, either. It was mostly gray, but had a light blue stripe on each of its sides. It had body parts that looked like fins on either side. She somehow knew that those helped it jump and let it turn faster in water. On the tip of its tail, there was a biological “jet.” She somehow knew that made it go fast, let it move in short bursts of speed in water, and let it sprint on land. There were two of what looked to be simple tentacles to either side of the “jet,” and she somehow knew those allowed for steady but slow movement in water as well as helping it sneak around on land. It had large protrusions that she saw electric shocks come from, so she presumed they were for electrocuting enemies, but for some reason, she also knew that it could be used for charming creatures. It had two horns facing the back of its head, and due to the nature of the dream, she knew it was for charging and for stabbing enemies. It had two eyes that had more binocular vision than most herbivores, but did not face fully to the front. It had a proboscis instead of a mouth. On its cheeks, there were things she somehow knew were for leaving either a trail of poison or for shooting poison out at enemies. Its two legs had simple feet with two toes on them, neither of which had claws. 

The creature tried to get at her, and her mouse hole was exposed, since there was no fridge to hide it. It could not get at her, but she was still terrified. It made sounds that reminded her of insects, and three more creatures appeared behind it. 

They were almost identical to the one that called them. The only difference were that these three lacked legs and crawled like worms, which was slower than the one walking. They made the same sounds as the one that seemed to call them. Jobrare suspected that the one with legs was an alpha to the ones without them because they did not attack each other, which led her to think that they were part of the same pack. They also tried to claw at the hole to her living area, even though their feet had no claws. Fortunately, she woke up. She took a risk and checked to see if they were outside her home, and they were not. She was glad that they and the dream she had were not real, but wondered how her mind came up with the creatures she saw in her dream. She went back to her sleeping area and eventually drifted off to sleep for the rest of the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unlike Edo or Kaly, Jobrare can fly. That is because she is mature and strong enough to do so. All four of them each have the four wings all Kinnises have since birth. Her parents and her older brother, Kitrari Goldberry. I haven't decided if her younger sister, Tirtare Goldberry, can fly yet. Even if she can't in 2007, she could at least glide and slow her falling speed to a safe level then. By the time Kaly was born in 2010, Tirtare could definitely fly. The question is when she became strong enough.
> 
> I got the name Berg from a scrapped idea in an upcoming story of mine. It was basically just an adaptation of a Minecraft modded survival that cannot exist due to some of the mods being for different versions of the vanilla game. The analogue to Steve would be named "Berg" as a reference to Steven Spielberg. I got his family name, "Mason," from a random name generator, and it's a common family name in English-speaking countries anyway.
> 
> The creatures that showed up in Jobrare's dream are supposed to be a creation of mine from Maxis' 2008 video game Spore. I used the Early Creature Creator in the game to make something with the highest possible stats using only that creator. Unfortunately, the DNA point budget the creators from the main menu have prevented me from adding legs. that is how I got to the one without legs in the story. That one is called the "Oystawany," which I got from a random name generator included in the game. I took it into the regular Creature Creator and added one of the three sets of legs also available in the Early Creature Creator. That is called the "Super Oystawany." Here, the Super Oystawany is the alpha of the three Oystawanies (I decided that's the plural form of them). Go to my DeviantArt account (named "Duscara") to see pictures of them, though they will be uploaded tomorrow and the day after tomorrow at 5 PM according to Standard Central Time.


	3. Less Than a Week

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jobrare gets seen by Berg when she falls for a unique trap.

Once the Sun rose the morning after the night where Jobrare dreamed she was under attack by three creatures she had never seen before, she listened in the hope that Berg would not notice that things had gone missing. To her horror, he said, “Damn it! Now I have mice! Or worse, rats!” 

She realized she needed to be more careful to not be seen and slain by a mouse, unless he was mistaking her for one, so she ate the rest of the grape she had started the previous day and waited for night to come so she could take more things. During that time, she remembered the dream she had when she slept in the tree. She realized that the thing she saw when she was hearing that scary voice looked like a helmet. 

Night came, he came back home after work, and once he went to bed, Jobrare realized she would like a proper bed, and since she saw powder puffs the night before, she decided to get one to use as a bed. She was walking to the kitchen when she walked onto something she didn’t see in the dark. She stepped on a pressure plate on one side of a cube folded into a net that caused the other five sides to close around her. As for the top, it was attached to one of the sides. She was now trapped, though whoever set this up, probably Berg, made it a cage with bars rather than something with no air holes. She tried to get out on her own, but the springs that she didn’t know caused those movements were too strong for her to push apart. She feared for her life, but could do little other than wait for what she saw as her death. She then wondered how and why he would trap a mouse like this, since it was far from normal. 

Morning came, and once Berg walked into the kitchen as Jobrare felt by his footsteps, she stopped moving. He said to himself, “It fell for this. It was experimental, so I didn’t know if it was going to work.” 

Those words caused her to be terrified. He picked it up, and she played dead, trying to fool him. There was silence, so she opened her eyes and saw him giving her a blank stare. He said, “Is that a… tiny person? With wings, a tail, and mouse ears? How the hell is that possible?” 

He approached her, and she started fearing for her life, remembering the horror stories her parents told her about humans. She started trying to break free by pushing against opposite sides as if to build up force until she could push against a wall enough to fold it, where she would fly away. She felt that it would be terrifying to look up at his face, but did so anyway. 

To her surprise, he did not look like he wanted her dead. Instead, he looked some other emotion that Jobrare had trouble figuring out. He said, “I’m going to free you, but please don’t run away. Or fly away, if you can fly. I thought you were a mouse. I want to talk.” 

She did not expect a human would ever willingly help a Kinnis like her, so she tried to nod. However, she did not know if nodding meant the same to him as it did to Kinnises (she didn’t know that Kinnises copied humans in that regard and not the other way around like she thought), so she said, “Yes! P-promise you won’t eat me!” 

He was surprised that she could talk, but did not comment on it. Instead, he replied, “Why the hell would I eat you? I promise I would never do that,” and he opened up one of the walls. Jobrare walked out, then onto his hand. Once he was holding her and he had set down the trap, he said, “Please don’t go.” 

His hand was shaky and standing on flesh was hard in general, but Jobrare decided to put her hands on his to support herself. She also moved to her knees and hands were on his, which was more stable. He asked, “What’s your name?” 

Looking up at his face, she said nothing at first, hesitant to reveal information like that, but as he stared at her awkwardly, she said, “Jobrare! I’m Jobrare Goldberry!” 

He said, “That’s an odd name.” 

This upset her, though she did not say it, fearing that an insult would lead to her death at his hands. He asked, “W-what the hell are you? Why are you so tiny? Why do you have those ears, a tail, and wings? Are you a fairy?” 

Giving in, she said, “My species is known as Kinnises. I’ve always been this size, and I’ve always had these wings, this tail, and these ears. Though, when I think about it, my kind may have been the basis for tiny people in human myths around the world.” 

“If you’re okay with it, I’d like to help you out. Where do you live?” 

She was again not saying things, fearing for her life if he learned she stole things from him to survive. He commented, “Do you, perhaps, live in the walls or under the floors?” 

Jobrare was visibly shocked at how quickly this human was figuring her out. He asked, “Your reaction means you live there, don’t you?” 

“Y-yes,” 

“Do you take things from humans to survive, perhaps?” 

“H-how did you figure it out?!” 

“I’m quite good at picking things up. I’m not mad, since you probably needed those things far more than I did. Someone in the UK also released a novel with a similar premise to that back in the 1950s, only those tiny people were just smaller humans; they had no animal ears, tail, or wings. It has been adapted at least five times, which is more than most works get. Could the author have seen Kinnises and forgot they had mouse ears, tails, and wings?” 

Berg realized she was staring at him because she was confused. Feeling awkward, he said, “I’d like you to stay with me, but it’s up to you.” 

Jobrare did not know if he was honest or not, but she said, “What do you have in mind?” 

“Oh, right. You would just need to ask and I’d give you food and water. You wouldn’t have to worry about those things, as well as threats, as long as you stayed with me.” 

She thought that it was too good to resist despite seeming too good to be true, so she nodded. In her mind, he was giving her a choice and could say she fell for it if it turned out to be a trap. Despite that, she wondered if they could be more than just friends… despite the fact that he just met her. 

Jobrare remembered times she asked her parents why they couldn’t have humans help them. In her then young mind, humans could help with many tasks that would be difficult or even impossible for Kinnises. Both Loktari and Pomtare shot that idea down, explaining that Kinnises have to remain hidden from humans because humans are so much more massive than they were, so it would be easy for a human to kill a Kinnis. From then on, her parents had told her horror stories about humans finding Kinnises and eating whole families alive without guilt, crushing them under their feet, or worse. She figured out on her own that those stories were meant to scare her away from trying to befriend humans. 

Thinking about the humans in those horror stories and then looking at Berg, Jobrare wondered if the Kinnises that told those stories had actually seen real humans, because Berg acted nothing like what she heard humans were like.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you haven’t figured it out, the British 1950s novel Berg mentions is supposed to be The Borrowers. I’ve read the original novel before, though that is the only one of the novels I’ve read. I decided that it exists as an in-universe novel series in all of my worlds.
> 
> The Goldberry family acts a lot like Borrowers. Some other Kinnises do as well, but others act in different ways.


	4. Catalyst

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Berg helps out Jobrare, earns her trust, and reveals the existence of tiny people to the world.
> 
> To make up for revealing a secret, Berg plays a game with the tiny woman.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got carried away and made this over 2,000 words long.

Berg said, “Okay, first things first, we need to make ways for you to get from place to place,”

Jobrare replied, “That actually sounds pretty good. I never thought I would live with a human who would assist me. All my life, I’ve been told that humans were dangerous creatures that killed Kinnises without guilt and had both size and intelligence in their favor.”

“… That seems very immoral. I promise I would never do those things to you. The majority of humans would likely not act that way, though I do fear that about 1% of humans would try to kill your kind. That’d be… holy $#!t, that would be over 60 million people if it were 1%!”

Jobrare was shocked. “A-are there really that many humans in the world? I swore that the world existed for Kinnises.”

He replied, “You really think that? And as far as I know, there are between six billion and seven billion humans in the world.”

She was even more shocked at just how many humans there were. Berg said, “Though I suppose, looking to reason and science, that the world is not made for Kinnises, but it’s not made for humans, either. Back to me helping you, let’s help make your bed! Would you like to be in my shirt pocket as I go search?”

She nodded, wondering what it would be like. He put the hand she was on near a pocket around his heart. He softly said, “Climb down into it. I hope your wings won’t get in the way.”

She said, “You don’t have to speak softly. I can hear you just fine when you talk normally, and it doesn’t hurt my ears.”

Once she managed to get inside, she could feel his heartbeat, which was very relaxing. She said, “I was going to use a powder puff as a bed,” and he asked, “Still want that?”

“Yes, I do. I have a blanket for it as well.”

They got a powder puff large enough to put her entire body on and set it up on Berg’s nightstand. He asked, “Are all Kinnises, as you called them, scared of humans?”

“Most of them are. My parents told me that some believed that humans wanted to help them, but it was a trap that led to their deaths.”

“I can prove to you that your fear is senseless, but you have to trust me.”

“If you wanted to kill me, you would have done so already… right?”

“Even if there are no laws that prohibit me from killing you, I would still never do that.”

Jobrare breathed a sign of relief knowing she was safe with this human. To her surprise, he pulled out his newly released alPhone, took a photo of her, connected it to his computer, then uploaded it on Fakebook and MyFace, two different and competing social media platforms. He said to her, “I took a photo of you on my alPhone, a new phone made by Orange, a tech giant whose other big products are the alMac, the alBook, and the alPod. I uploaded the photo online by connecting it to my computer. I will prove that Kinnises’ fear of humans is pointless. Hell, some people in high places may offer their support to tiny people like you.”

She was visibly shocked at this, which she thought of as a betrayal, but knew it was too late to do anything, and she still had some fear of him that told her that he was dangerous despite trying to help her. She got her blanket and her bag from her old house, and moved them to the nightstand. It was getting late, so they went to bed together, hoping they were prepared for whatever happened next. He wondered if other humans would find Kinnises in their homes, and she hoped not to be kidnapped or killed.

When Berg woke up the next morning, he saw that other people were now posting photos of them finding tiny people with similar traits to Jobrare online. Once she saw this, she said, “You just exposed my kind, who have hidden from humans for hundreds if not thousands of years!”

Berg was surprised at her lashing out, especially since just the day before, she had begged him not to eat her. He defended his viewpoint and said, “I’m pretty sure there will come a day when Kinnises and humans are treated as equals. Even though humans have treated other humans that are different from them as inferior, or even property.”

“D-do you think that we’ll become like those?”

“Of course not! That was outlawed in the US in the mid 1800s, so it’s been outlawed for over a hundred years! I don’t think they’ll bring it back and have Kinnises be the target of that injustice.”

Once Berg came home from work that day, he decided that he wanted to play a silly word game called Mad Takes. He brought one of the tablet books of it he owned to the table, where Jobrare was. He said, “I want to play the game Mad Takes with you.”

“How do you play?”

“It’s pretty damn simple. Since there are multiple people playing, one of us, the reader, selects a short story in this. All of them are missing certain words. The reader doesn’t tell them what the story is about. Instead, they ask the other player, the writer, of which there can be more than one, to give them words. These words are used to fill in the story.”

“I think I understand.”

“How about each of us selects a story, while the other one gives words?”

“That sounds fair.”

Berg selected a story titled “Can I Have Your Daughter’s Hand?”

He said, “Give me a silly word,”

She said, “Memay,”

“Did you mean to say ‘meme’?”

“Yeah, that. I don’t know how to spell it.”

Berg wrote it down in its section. Next, he said, “Give me another silly word.”

“Turtle. I don’t even know what that is. I just heard the human family I used to live with say it at one point.”

He wrote it down and said, “I’ll explain it later. Next, give me a verb.”

“What is that?”

“It’s an action. For example, ‘run’ is a verb.”

“I see. I choose ‘throw’.”

He wrote it down, then said, “I need a noun.”

“What kind of word is that?”

“A noun is a person, place, or thing.”

“Then I choose O’Donald. I’ve heard of it, though I don’t know what it is.”

“It’s a fast food restaurant chain. Some people think the meat used in their food is more than they’re saying.”

“I’m still going to choose it.”

“Give me a body part, but make it plural.”

“Does plural mean multiple?”

“Right on!”

“Can I choose a body part that humans don’t have, but Kinnises do?”

“I’d prefer you didn’t.”

“Then I choose legs.”

“I need a female name.”

“Belle.”

“Okay. Now I need a verb ending in ‘ed’.”

“Scratched.”

“Noun, please.”

“alPod.”

“Did you see the label on mine?”

“Yes.”

“Anyway, I need a plural noun.”

“Dinosaurs.”

“Now, I need a verb.”

“Hide.”

“I need a noun again.”

“Book.”

“Occupation.”

“Is that like a job, career, or profession?”

“… Yes, but those things are different. A job is the closest to occupation, a career is like all of and the history of the jobs you’ve had in your life, and a profession is what you’re trained to do. A profession and job can be different, and the difference of those two can upset the people whose job is not their profession. I still need a word for that.”

“Mailman.”

“Number.”

“9,001.”

“…I’d rather you not reference that, but I’ll let it slide. I need a verb.”

“Sleep.”

“Another silly word is what I need.”

“Toaster.”

“And finally, I need a silly name.”

“Fatfatface.”

Berg said, “This short story is called, ‘Can I Have Your Daughter’s Hand?’”

Jobrare said, “I wonder what it’ll be like?”

Berg read, “Dear Mr. and Mrs. Meme Turtle, Will you let me throw your O’Donald?-”

Jobrare couldn’t resist laughing at the first sentence. Berg asked, “Is this your first time playing?”

She nodded and hoped he’d understand through her laughs, but she decided to make sure and said, “Yes!”

“Anyway, continuing the story, ‘Ever since I have laid legs on Belle, I have scratched madly in love with her. I wish that she will be the alPod of my dinosaurs and that someday we will hide happily ever after. I have a book as a mailman that pays $9001 each month. I promise to sleep Belle with kindness and respect. Sincerely, Fatfatface.’”

Jobrare was laughing for longer than she’d done before in her life, but she calmed down enough to choose another short story titled, “The Crawl-Nut Difference” because she liked the sound of Crawl-Nut, unaware of its practices.

“Give me a verb, Berg.”

“Kick.”

“Next, I need an adjective.”

“Prideful.”

“I now need a plural noun.”

“Eggs.”

“Adjective, please!”

“Rainbow.”

“Currently, I need a verb ending in ‘ing’.”

“Fighting.”

“I just need a verb now.”

“Lift.”

“I need a number.”

“Pi.”

“That’ s a food.”

“I meant the one that was spelled “P-I”

“I didn’t know that was a word.”

“It is roughly 3.14, though it goes on forever. It is the circumference of any circle divided by its diameter.”

“I don’t know what three of those words mean.”

“Just write it how I spelled it.”

She did that and said, “I need another adjective.”

“Political.”

“Now, I need three plural nouns in a row.”

“Films. Wizards. Novels.”

“How do you spell the second and third words?”

“The word ‘Wizard’ is spelled W-I-Z-A-R-D-S. The word ‘Novels’ is spelled N-O-V-E-L-S. Take the ‘S’ off each one, and you have a singular noun.”

She wrote those, then said, “I need a plural relative.”

“Step-granduncles-in-law.”

“How do you spell that?”

“You put ‘Step’ followed by a line in the middle, then put the word ‘granduncles’ and another line, and the words ‘in-law’.”

She wrote those, then said “I need two adjectives.”

“Bulky for the first, and thick for the second.”

“I need one more plural noun.”

“Hippies.”

Jobrare managed to get the tablet to show the story with blanks and the words she needed to fill in. She said, “Come kick at Crawl-Nut, where you’ll receive prideful discounts on all of your favorite brand name eggs. Our rainbow and fighting associates are there to lift you pi hours a day. Here you will find political prices on the films you need. Wizards for the moms, novels for the kids and all the latest electronics for the step-granduncles-in-law. So come on down to your bulky thick Crawl-Nut where the hippies come first.”

“Before we continue, I just need to say that Crawl-Nut is evil.”

“Why?”

“They treat their employees like slaves, criminally underpay them, they lock the night shift workers in, they strap bombs to the workers and threaten to blow them up if they leave before their shift is over, they manipulate hours so they don’t have to give their workers benefits, and they use lawsuits against the competing stores that they bribe their way to winning.”

“How would anyone buy from them if they do that?”

“Their prices are lower than at competing stores, and the prices at those stores are higher so that their employees can make a living.”

She noticed he was still nervous after he said that. She asked, “What’s wrong?”

Berg said really fast, “I-I love you, Jobrare! I mean…-! I want us to be boyfriend and girlfriend!”

He held his eyes tightly shut, waiting for her reaction.

She said, “I’ve been feeling the same way. Wow, I never thought I’d get to say that I wanted to have romance with a human. I mean, I kept it a secret from my family. I accept your offer.”

Berg opened his eyes, stared down at the tiny form, and grabbed her.

She said, “Be more gentle!”

He gave her a hug, pushing her towards his chest. Once she realized what was happening, she gripped his shirt and leaned in. She said, “My family doesn’t know where I am, so they won’t yell at me, because I know they would not approve of me dating a human.”

Berg replied, “Well then, let’s just hope they never find us. Just so you know, I used to date a girl in high school, but we broke up, though we are still friends. I wonder how she would react to you if she discovered you? I mean, how she would view you both as my new girlfriend and as a person?”

Jobrare said, “I don’t want to find out in case she gets jealous and doesn’t think of me as equal to a human.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The reason I called this final chapter “Catalyst” was because its events, specifically Berg uploading the pictures of Jobrare on social media, are is how humans discovered Kinnises. However, it doesn’t really play into the story.
> 
> Berg has an alPod, the counterpart to the iPod. He has not modded it because flash memory is still expensive to get at capacities rivaling the hard drives the iPods were made with, if SD cards or solid state drives with that capacity even existed at the time. 
> 
> The reason why Berg said there were between six billion and seven billion humans in the world is because the world’s population reached six billion in 1999, and it took until 2011 for the population to reach seven billion. Both of those are real figures and facts, but they also apply to the universe Kinnises exist in.
> 
> The name Mad Takes was taken from an online version of Mad Libs. Unus Annus used it for one of their videos, and I got the short stories from that video as well, only slightly changing one. I saw it before the channel’s demise in November 2020, a year after it formed. I was not there for their final video.

**Author's Note:**

> That's a wrap!
> 
> Starting on December 24th and ending on December 27th, I will release a story a day. The first two days will be two non-canon, self-contained, independent Christmas stories. I'm not even religious, but Christianity is dominant in the United States, where I live. Just this year, I will release actual fanfic on the 26th. Since the next day, the 27th, will be a Sunday, I'll upload the first chapter of the sequel to Hopeful Future and the fourth and final part of the universe where Kinnises exist. That will be the last Sunday in 2020, so the rest of the story will be uploaded in 2021. That story will be RATED ADULT FOR GRAPHIC VIOLENCE!
> 
> Anyway, here is some information I couldn't fit anywhere else without shoehorning it in:
> 
> Since it takes place in 2007, Gru-Ray and my worlds' version of HD-DVD are still fighting each other. In real life, that format war started in 2006, when both came out, and ended in early 2008, when Toshiba, the company that made HD-DVD, announced that they would no longer make players for those. HDTVs are also not that common because their high price at the time kept people from buying them.
> 
> Berg Mason still has a CRT TV as his main TV. He doesn’t yet have an HDTV because they’re too expensive, and he doesn’t want to be on the losing side in the ongoing format war. It has component cables, which is how he plugs in his VCR.
> 
> He still has a VCR that uses VHS tapes, but he mostly uses it for playback of either videocassettes he has recorded to, or ones that are prerecorded. I didn’t have a specific model in mind, but it is one of the front loading ones that is smaller than the earlier, top loading ones. It also has 4 heads and Hi-Fi Stereo.
> 
> The Xbox 360, the Nintendo Wii, and the PS3 are all out, but the PS2 is still going strong.
> 
> Speaking of the PS2, Berg uses a PS2 Slim as his DVD player even though the PS3, Wii, and Xbox 360 are all out and are more powerful gaming consoles. Apparently, some people in real life used their PS2s as DVD players for years, not getting PS2 games for quite a while. He hooks it to the TV through his VCR, as his TV only has one set of inputs. The TV plays DVDs just fine, unlike what happened to some early adopters of DVD who plugged the players into their CRT TVs through their VCR. He also uses a PS2 DVD remote control.
> 
> He has two plug and play games from the early to mid 2000s. Specifically, he has the 2003 Pacman one made by Jakks Pacific, and the 2004 Mrs. Pac Man one also made by them. He has to unplug his VCR and PS2 to play them. He got them in stores for himself because he thought they would be fun to play.
> 
> I haven’t decided what kind of desktop or laptop computer Berg uses when he’s at home. It doesn’t matter.


End file.
